SNOW HILL — There is no over-under on wins for Greene Central High School’s boys basketball team going into the season.

That number will fluctuate by the game.

Jim Cole, the Rams’ third coach in three years and fourth in five, wants to win them all, as they say, one at a time.

“A lot of coaches will say, ‘Well, our goal is this,’ or, ‘We want to have this record or that record,’ ” Cole, a former assistant women’s coach at Appalachian State, said. “And my thought is always: You say you’re going to win 18 games. Well, which games are you planning on losing?”

Greene Central returns a nucleus of largely unproven juniors and seniors from a team that went 6-15 in the one-year tenure of coach Elijah Rouse.

Guards Jalyn Harper, a senior, and Brandon Belcher, a junior, anchor an offense that plans to keep the tempo high. The Rams’ game plan will include playing strong defense and pushing the ball up the floor.

“Everything’s going to be fast,” the 6-foot Harper said. “We’ll play a fast-paced game this year. Ain’t nothing going to be slow.”

Cole, who was the boys head coach at Western Harnett for a season before taking last year off to earn a degree in administration, said that getting from one end of the court quickly is one thing; finishing is another.

“Just because we rush up the floor doesn’t mean we need to rush up a shot,” Cole said. “That’s part of the teaching process that we’re going through right now.”

Cole described Harper as an “extremely competitive” leader who adjusts to instruction exceptionally well.

The coach characterized the 5-foot-10 Belcher as a hard-nosed player, adding that he successfully took four charges and tried to draw several others during a recent 20-minute scrimmage.

A left-handed point guard, Belcher expects that type of play to be the Rams’ m.o.

Greene Central’s girls, meanwhile, are coming off a dismal 0-21 campaign. They’ll look for improvement under first-year coach Meredith Franklin, who did not return multiple calls for this story.

While Cole admits the team he inherited is “pretty long and pretty athletic,” he is wary of his players’ collective inexperience. But he believes improvement will come with time.

“I expect us to see a lot of growth throughout the course of the year,” Cole, who came to Greene Central in early September, said. “I don’t know how strong we’re going to look early in the season, but I do expect us to grow a lot during the year just because of the kind of kids that we have.”

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David Hall can be reached at (252) 559-1086 or at david.hall@kinston.com.